Manuel reshaped the political maps of the Balkans and the eastern Mediterranean, placing the kingdoms of Hungary and Outremer under Byzantine hegemony and campaigning aggressively against his neighbours both in the west and in the east.

Swiftly, he dispatched the megas domestikos John Axouch ahead of him, with orders to arrest his most dangerous potential rival, his brother Isaac, who was living in the Great Palace with instant access to the imperial treasure and regalia.

[9] In 1146 Manuel assembled his army at the military base Lopadion and set out on a punitive expedition against Mas'ud, the Sultan of Rûm, who had been repeatedly violating the frontiers of the Empire in western Anatolia and Cilicia.

[10] There was no attempt at a systematic conquest of territory, but Manuel's army defeated the Turks at Acroënus, before capturing and destroying the fortified town of Philomelion, removing its remaining Christian population.

At this time, there were still members of the Byzantine court who remembered the passage of the First Crusade, a defining event in the collective memory of the age that had fascinated Manuel's aunt, Anna Komnene.

This cautious approach was well advised, but still the numerous incidents of covert and open hostility between the Franks and the Greeks on their line of march, for which it seems both sides were to blame, precipitated conflict between Manuel and his guests.

[3] Peace having been restored, a grand ceremonial procession was staged on 12 April 1159 for the triumphant entry of the Byzantine army into the city, with Manuel riding through the streets on horseback, while the Prince of Antioch and the King of Jerusalem followed on foot.

[16] Roger died in February 1154 and was succeeded by William I, who faced widespread rebellions against his rule in Sicily and Apulia, leading to the presence of Apulian refugees at the Byzantine court.

[30] He sent Michael Palaiologos and John Doukas, both of whom held the high imperial rank of sebastos, with Byzantine troops, ten ships and large quantities of gold to invade Apulia in 1155.

[b] Nevertheless, with the help of disaffected local barons, including Count Robert of Loritello, Manuel's expedition achieved astonishingly rapid progress as the whole of southern Italy rose up in rebellion against the Sicilian Crown and the untried William I.

[32] Encouraged by the success, Manuel dreamed of restoration of the Roman Empire, at the cost of union between the Orthodox and the Catholic Church, a prospect which would frequently be offered to the Pope during negotiations and plans for alliance.

[37] Both Nicetas Choniates and Kinnamos, the major Byzantine historians of this period, agree, however, that the peace terms Axouch secured from William allowed Manuel to extricate himself from the war with dignity, despite a devastating raid by a Norman fleet of 164 ships (carrying 10,000 men) on Euboea and Almira in 1156.

Even if a pro-western emperor such as Manuel agreed, the Greek citizens of the empire would have rejected outright any union of this sort, as they did almost three hundred years later when the Orthodox and Catholic churches were briefly united under the pope.

The expense of Manuel's involvement in Italy must have cost the treasury a great deal (probably more than 2.16 million hyperpyra or 30,000 pounds of gold), and yet it produced only limited solid gains.

In 1167, Manuel sent 15,000 men under the command of Andronikos Kontostephanos against the Hungarians,[50] scoring a decisive victory at the Battle of Sirmium and enabling the Empire to conclude a very advantageous peace with the Kingdom of Hungary by which Syrmia, Bosnia and Dalmatia were ceded.

Following the deaths of both Iziaslav and Vladimirko, the situation became reversed; when Yuri of Suzdal, Manuel's ally, took over Kiev and Yaroslav, the new ruler of Galicia, adopted a pro-Hungarian stance.

This situation, holding out the alarming prospect of Andronikos making a bid for Manuel's throne sponsored by both Galicia and Hungary, spurred the Byzantines into an unprecedented flurry of diplomacy.

A mission to Kiev, then ruled by Prince Rostislav, resulted in a favourable treaty and a pledge to supply the Empire with auxiliary troops; Yaroslav of Galicia was also persuaded to renounce his Hungarian connections and return fully into the imperial fold.

Furthermore, Manuel may have wanted to encourage Amalric's plans, not only to deflect the ambitions of the Latins away from Antioch, but also to create new opportunities for joint military ventures that would keep the King of Jerusalem in his debt, and would also allow the Empire to share in territorial gains.

[63] Despite the bad feelings generated at Damietta, Amalric still refused to abandon his dream of conquering Egypt, and he continued to seek good relations with the Byzantines in the hopes of another joined attack, which never took place.

[65] In 1177, a fleet of 150 ships was sent by Manuel I to invade Egypt, but returned home after appearing off Acre due to the refusal of Count Philip of Flanders and many important nobles of the Kingdom of Jerusalem to help.

According to the agreement, certain frontier regions, including the city of Sebasteia, should be handed over to Manuel in return for some quantity of cash, while it also obliged the Seljuk Sultan Kilij Arslan II to recognize his overlordship.

[43][67] Kilij Arslan II used the peace with Byzantium, and the power vacuum caused by the death in 1174 of Nur ad-Din Zangi the ruler of Syria, to expel the Danishmends from their Anatolian emirates.

[73] Most of the casualties were borne by the right wing, largely composed of allied troops commanded by Baldwin of Antioch, and also by the baggage train, which was the main target of the Turkish ambush.

[81] Demetrius of Lampe, a Byzantine diplomat recently returned from the West, ridiculed the way the verse was interpreted there, that Christ was inferior to his father in his humanity but equal in his divinity.

Historian Mark C. Bartusis argues that Manuel (and his father as well) tried to rebuild a national army, but his reforms were adequate for neither his ambitions nor his needs; the defeat at Myriokephalon underscored the fundamental weakness of his policies.

The Venetians, the Genoese, and others opened up the ports of the Aegean to commerce, shipping goods from the Crusader kingdoms of Outremer and Fatimid Egypt to the west and trading with Byzantium via Constantinople.

"[106] William of Tyre called Manuel "a wise and discreet prince of great magnificence, worthy of praise in every respect", "a great-souled man of incomparable energy", whose "memory will ever be held in benediction."

[111] ^ c: Magdalino underscores that, whereas John had removed the Rupenid princes from power in Cilicia twenty years earlier, Manuel allowed Toros to hold most of his strongholds he had taken, and effectively restored only the coastal area to imperial rule.

[22] For his part, historian Zachary Nugent Brooke believes that the victory of Christianity against Nur ad-Din was made impossible, since both Greeks and Latins were concerned primarily with their own interests.